6th Woman Scream International Art and Poetry Festival, Kolkata: Event Report

The recently celebrated 6th Woman Scream International Art and Poetry Festival, Kolkata, which took the city by storm on March 26, 2015, was a grand follow-up to the international event of Woman Scream 2016 initiated by Jael Uribe, poet and activist, Dominican Republic with a unifying mission to eradicate violence on women.  On the occasion of women’s month, March, Rhythm Divine Poets group and Art Fair coordinated and organized the Kolkata chapter with Woman Scream International Poetry and Art Festival initiated by Women Poets International Movement (Mujeres Poetas Internacional MPI) from the Dominican Republic, coordinated by Jael Uribe, MPI’s President. 

The Kolkata partners for this event, Rhythm Divine, with it’s event associate Art Fair organized a fascinating and fun filled event with volunteers of Modern Girls High School to commemorate the occasion. They teemed up to put up an art exhibition and performance based show where poets, artists, writers, actors came together to raise voice against violence on women.

This global event started back in 2012. It is reported that about 600 events are organized all over the world to raise voice against such brutalities and Rhythm Divine Poets group in collaboration with Art Fair did the same on 26th March in Mandeville Gardens, a poets home to spread awareness about this pressing chaos that woman are facing everyday.

After Sufia Khatoon’s speech on woman during the festival and moderated beautifully by Mona Sengupta of Ahava Communications, the eminent guests like fashion designer Sumita Banerii, internationally reputed Poets and educationists Sharmila Ray and Sanjukta Dasgupta along with the Kolkata musical sensation and internationally recognised singer Somali Panda inaugurated the festival with great enthusiasm. 

Among the highlights were the youthful presence of the students of Modern High School and Delhi Public School Himadri Agarwal who recited a poem and Ishita Sharaf and Divyaa Bagra presented a contemporary dance.
The ocassion witnessed the cover launch of Kushal Poddar’s international literary Magazine ‘Wordsurfacing’, unveiled by the editor himself and reputed theater personality Pragya Goel Gupta.

Incredible Woman of India Founder Rhiti Bose shared her journey to compile a wonderful anthology called Defiant Dreams: Tales of Everyday Divas with The audience.

Sharmila Ray and Sanjukta Dasgupta rendered their special performance. Their luminous presence gives this ocassion a rarity and delicacy. The Rhythm Divine core group Sufia Khatoon, Dr Amit Shankar Saha, Kushal Poddar and Sana Mohammed surprised all by teaming up for a performance poetry on the issue.

The open mic poetry session was moderated by Anindita Bose Co Founder Rhythm Divine Poets and Poet Mohit Jain which saw poets from all walks of life coming and sharing their experience snd verses on woman empowerment.

Musician and singer Somali Panda mesmerized the audience with her soulful songs. Actor Siddhaarth Agarwala presented an act depicting the abuses on woman. Kolkata Music Dairy captivated the audience with their soulful music. In the end  Dr Amit Shankar Saha Co-Founder Rhythm Divine Poets gave out the certificates to the participating artists and poets and uttered the vote of thanks.
The other attractions included an art show by Art Fair artists along with Modern Girls High School students and hanging paper birds and butterflies installation by Pragya Sharaf under the guidance of artist Sufia Khatoon.

Sufia Khatoon, Curator Art Fair and Co-Founder Rhythm Divine Poets group worked on Kite Message installation carrying messages on women’s issues and strength from more than 100 poets, author, artists, singers, dancers.

Artist, Curator and Social Activist Sufia Khatoon could only smile seeing the expressions on everyone’s face.
“It was very tiring and difficult to do the entire event but like minded people, artists, singers, poets, writers, etc all joined hands to make this festival a remarkable achievement for us. The exhibition, the performance,  the love that is seeping through this evening is something that everyone will cherish and our message has really reached across borders. We were able to change things I am sure, even if one person thought against violence our hardwork has paid off I feel, today I can sleep peacefully and just remember every moment and friends who made this happen. All it takes is a step to bring greater changes and we have taken the right step”. Sufia said on this remarkable occasion. 

Anindita Bose, co-founder of Rhythm Divine felt overwhelmed with the kind of people who came to watch the entire show, Dr Amit Shankar Saha, another co-founder of the group felt it was the entire team’s hardworking that could spread the message of the festival joining everyone together.

The Kolkata chapter of Woman Scream International Art and Poetry Festival was co-sponsored by Incredible Women of India, Manya Education Pvt Limited and The Princeton Review and generously hosted by the Berlia family in Kolkata saw more than 60 people of all age gathered to give support to the performers during the festival.
> Print partner SIBCO Overseas Pvt Ltd and Admakers
> Gift sponsored by Readomania
> Radio Partner Radio One 94.3FM
> Online Web media partner Incredible Woman of India and Calcalling
> Online media and literary partner Readomania, Incredible Woman of India, Learning and Creativity and Being Bookworms
> Partnered by Wordsurfacing, Hamari Sanskriti and AHAVA COMMUNICATIONS
> Print Media Partner News Beat
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Guests of honour to inaugurate the show
Guest 1: Sanjukta Dasgupta is Professor and Former Head, Dept of English and Former Dean, Faculty of Arts, Calcutta University. Recipient of the Fulbright postdoctoral fellowship and Fulbright Scholar in Residence grant, Australia India Council fellowship, Gender Studies fellowship grant, University of British Columbia, among others,  she has has been invited to participate in conferences and teach/lecture at universities in the USA, UK, Europe, Canada and Australia.  She was also the Chairperson of the Commonwealth Writers Prize jury panel ( 2003-2005) and visited Melbourne and Malta in 2004-2005. In 2014

She is a poet, short story writer, critic and translator and her published books are The Novels of Huxley and Hemingway: A Study in Two Planes of Reality, Responses : Selected Essays, Snapshots( poetry), Dilemma (poetry), First Language ( poetry), More Light (poetry) Abuse and Other Short Stories (Dasgupta Book Company, 2013)Towards Tagore A collection of Essays (ed with introduction -Visva Bharati Publications, 2014)
Guest 2: Poet Sharmila Ray
Sharmila Ray teaches history at City College, Kolkata, India.She has authored four books of poems. She is the current editor of the journal, Poetry Society of India.She has experimented her poems with sarod (Avijit Ghosh) and the result is a CD-Journey through Poetry and Music. Her poems, short stories, have appeared in various national and international journals and magazines. She has conducted poetry workshops with children organized by British Council and Poetry Society India. She has been reading her poems in various parts of the country.

See more at:

http://www.boloji.com/index.cfm?md=Mobile&sd=Articles&ArticleID=14054#sthash.Q2AsGy1p.dpuf
Guest 3…Shomali Panda
Somali Panda, a trained classical vocalist of Indian and Tagore music and currently working as a vocalist at Indus Dreaming. She is  on a journey to find out an elemental language like laughter or tears through music to reach out to the world…to find a common platform out where people around the world can share their worries and anguish within….to take a flight toward a harmony worldwide.
Guest 4: Sumita Banerjee,
An eminent lifestyle designer..her exclusive pieces of sarees have been exhibited in Dubai, Bangkok, Kaulamanpur, New York, and she provides employment opportunities to the local artists of Kolkata.  What is amazing about her is that she is a descendant of Rabindranath Tagore and grand niece of J.P. Ganguly, the eminent painter.
Performers details:

Kolkata Music Dairy, the musical group who knows the roots and lungs of passions and dreams, performed at the event, exhibiting rare soulful depth of passion with their musical performance. The group is a wonderful collaborative of individual musicians working together in a band, creating music with personal emotions that reflect the various shades of the society
Kolkata Music Diary is also a platform for new musicians. The project is inspired by the evergreen “MOHINER GHORAGULI”,  and focuses on their musical tribute to the city of joy, KOLKATA.

In all, it was a wonderfully enlightening session where creativity of artists and poets were showcased for a global cause.

Videos of performance poetry at the event:

Sufia Khatoon, Kushal Poddar and Amit Shankar Saha performs poetry at the Woman Scream 2016, Kolkata:

Dr. Sanjukta Dasgupta recites a poem at the event:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLhlRxBEaEo

Anindita Bose: Co-founder, Rhythm Divine recites her poem on the occasion:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flzpHTyMJe4

About the Author

Sufia Khatoon ( 5 Posts)

Sufia Khatoon is a social activist managing Our World Our Initiative, a social and philanthropic initiative to help underprivileged focusing on helping old people, children and orphans who are forced to beg or earn on the Streets. As an Art curator of Art Fair and artists she has exhibited her works in eminent galleries in Kolkata like Mirage Art Gallery, Birla Art gallery, Academy of Fine Arts, Chemould Art Gallery,  ICCR, Shrimati Art Gallery with more than 20 groups shows in 2 years. She has been featured *India Positive, CNN IBN*, Femina, Telegraph, Times of India, Taaza Tv various online portals, magazines and websites for her social and artworks... She is a young passionate enthusiast who loves to live her life. Writing for her is survival...without which she would lose her vision. Her poetry has been selected for various national and international anthologies namely Magnitude by IIA, Umbilical Cord by Rejected stuff, Milange by Poets corner, Kaafiyana of Delhi Poetry festival, Create2inspire initiated anthology The Dawn Beyond Waste, Avadh Literary Festival anthology 'Lifenaama', Red Balloon Anthology, Hall of Poets, Colours of Refugess, and many more. Her short stories has been published in various anthologies life 25 Strokes of Teen Life by Grapevine,  Seasons of Love, Myraid Tales and Life Sundae, Wordweavers, etc. She is the co-founder  of Rhythm Divine, a poets' group in Kolkata which focuses on promoting poetry, organizing creative writing workshops and featuring poets live on radio. It's about poetry reaching out to people and poets evolving. She is currently working on her poetry book.
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